Chapter 7 - The Deposition of Rowena
Forty-eight hours after the arrests at the Pierre Hotel, the high-profile criminal arraignment had set bail at one million dollars for Cressa and five hundred thousand for Rowena.
With their corporate sponsorship accounts frozen by emergency civil attachment orders, Leander refusing to answer their calls from his undisclosed location, and Cressa’s new husband, Julian Ward—an ambitious private equity executive whose family had spent fifty years cultivating old-money respectability—filing for an immediate annulment on grounds of criminal fraud, Rowena had to liquidate her personal stock portfolio to post their bonds.
On Thursday morning, Rowena sat at the end of the mahogany conference table in Vesper Hayes’s office for a court-ordered emergency deposition in our civil proceeding.
She was unrecognizable from the woman who had stood in my hallway two days earlier. Her Chanel coat was gone, replaced by a wrinkled department-store blazer; her hair was pulled back in a severe, hurried bun; and the dark hollows under her eyes betrayed forty-eight sleepless hours in the tombs of the court system.
Beside her sat Arthur Sterling, a high-priced defense attorney who looked visibly exhausted and deeply regretful of taking the retainer.
I sat across from her.
My bandage had been downsized to three thin strips of sterile tape across the healing wound, but the six black sutures were still visible, a dark, jagged railroad track across my cheek. I wore a tailored navy silk shirt, my hands resting calmly on the polished wood.
Vesper adjusted her glasses, leaned forward, and looked at the court reporter.
“Deposition of Rowena Caldwell in the matter of Maeve Caldwell versus Cressa Caldwell, Rowena Caldwell, and ViralForge LLC. Witness is sworn. Counsel, we are on the record.”
Vesper pulled a thick, color-coded ledger from her briefcase and dropped it onto the table with a dull, heavy thud.
“Mrs. Caldwell,” Vesper began, her tone quiet, clinical, and predatory. “Let’s talk about the company Caldwell Brand Partners LLC. Who is the primary beneficial owner?”
Rowena cleared her throat, her voice raspy. “I am.”
“And what percentage of Cressa Caldwell’s gross promotional revenue was funneled into that entity over the last thirty-six months?”
Rowena looked at her attorney. Arthur Sterling gave a faint, resigned nod.
“Forty percent,” Rowena whispered.
“Forty percent,” Vesper repeated. “Meaning that every time your daughter signed an endorsement deal, four out of every ten dollars went directly into your personal bank accounts to fund your mortgages, your luxury vehicles, and your country club memberships. Correct?”
“I was her manager,” Rowena said, a flash of her old arrogance flickering across her face. “I built her. I handled her negotiations, her media training, her stylists. I earned that money.”
“And when Lumière Royale told your daughter that her brand was failing—that she was boring—what did you do to protect your forty percent?”
Rowena’s jaw tightened. “I did what any good manager does. I strategized a narrative revitalization.”
“A narrative revitalization,” Vesper echoed softly.
She opened the green section of the ledger, sliding three printed emails across the table toward Rowena.
“This is an email thread from your private ProtonMail account, dated October 12th, sent to Derrick Vance,” Vesper read aloud. ‘Subject: Conservatory Staging. Text: Make sure the impact occurs before 10:00 PM. We need maximum emotional distress on Maeve’s face before the ambulance is summoned. The more severe the trauma looks on the 4K stream, the higher the viral conversion rate.’”
Rowena’s breath caught in her throat. Her hands began to tremble against her legal pad.
“You didn't just want an accident, did you, Rowena?” Vesper asked, stepping around the table, stopping two feet from my mother. “You specifically instructed Derrick Vance to create an injury that would bleed profusely because blood drives engagement on algorithmic video feeds.”
“I didn't mean for her to be permanently scarred!” Rowena shouted, her voice breaking into hysterical tears. “I thought she’d get a surface cut! A few drops of blood on the silk! I didn't know Derrick was going to use industrial wire!”
“You paid the invoice for the industrial wire!” Vesper fired back, slamming her palm onto the table with a crack that made Rowena flinch. “You personally authorized line item twenty-four: ‘High-tensile floral support armature and mechanical shear implements — $1,240.00.’”
Rowena buried her face in her trembling hands, weeping bitterly.
I leaned forward across the table. For the first time during the three-hour deposition, I spoke.
“Rowena.”
My mother slowly lifted her tear-streaked face, her eyes meeting mine through her trembling fingers.
“When I was nine years old,” I said quietly, “I broke my wrist falling off the parallel bars at gymnastics. I walked three miles home in the rain because you were at Cressa’s preliminary beauty pageant and told me not to call unless someone was dying.”
Rowena looked down at the table, unable to hold my gaze.
“For twenty years, I thought that if I just worked hard enough, if I was just dependable enough, if I took care of myself and never asked you for anything, you would eventually love me for who I was.”
I touched the six black sutures beneath my eye.
“Now I realize the truth. You never saw me as a daughter. You only saw me as raw material you couldn't control. And when you realized you couldn't control me, you decided to carve your daughter’s fame out of my flesh.”
Rowena reached across the table, her hand trembling, begging. “Maeve... please... I’m your mother. Cressa is your baby sister. We’re family. If you take this to trial, Cressa will go to prison. Her life will be destroyed!”
“Cressa destroyed her own life the moment she pushed me,” I replied, standing up from the conference chair, picking up my coat. “And as for you, Rowena... you aren't my mother. You’re just a defendant in a civil lawsuit.”
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I walked out of the conference room, leaving my mother weeping into the mahogany table, while Vesper’s voice continued behind me, cold, relentless, and unyielding:
“Next question, Mrs. Caldwell. Let’s discuss your tax filings for 2024...”
